Saturday, February 24, 2007

Teachings of the Bhagawad Gita: karmayoga

3.30 Devoid of the fever of the soul, engage in battle by dedicatingall actions to Me, with (your) mind intent on the Self, and becomingfree from expectations and egoism.

Bhagwaan Shankara's commentary

Vigata-jvarah, devoid of the fever of the soul, i.e. being free fromrepentance, without remorse; yuddhyasva, engage in battle;sannyasya, by dedicating; sarvani, all; karmani, actions; mayi, toMe, who am Vasudeva, the omniscient supreme Lord, the Self of all;adhyatma-cetasa, with (your) mind intent on the Self-withdiscriminating wisdom, with this idea, 'I am an agent, and I workfor God as a servant'; and further, bhutva, becoming; nirasih, freefrom expectations ['Free from expectations of results foryourself']; and nirmamah, free from egoism. You from whom hasvanished the idea, '(this is) mine', are nirmamah.

This sloka is one of the most important slokas of the Bhagawad Gita,and carries tremendous significance for reflection as well asunderstanding.

The Self referred to here is Vasudeva or Ishwara as karmaphaladaata.

Let us see what is implied and explained.

What is karma? Any action done with an intent.Whenever we do any action there are two things involved icchashkatiand kriyashakti - the capacity to desire and the capacity to do.(Now a doubt may arise - suppose I trample an insect while walkingon the street? Is that a karma - i didn't intend to trample it - yesit is - it is an act of omission - the intent was to cross thestreet but in performing that task, care should have taken to notcause harm.)

So karmas are intentional acts of both commision as well as omission.

Now no action is possible without desire. And desire is always forthe fruit of the action.A surgeon performs a surgery. It is an act. What is his desire? Thatthe surgery be successful. Now can he perform the action with nodesire that the surgery be successful? Of course not. Then how canhe be free from expectation? The Lord and Sankara make it clear -free from expectations of the results for "my"self - nirasihnirmamah. He wants the surgery to be successful. But he knows thisresult is not in his hands. It is in the hands of the SupremeBestower of the results of all actions - the Karmaphaladaata - whichis Ishwara. And is this Ishwara sitting in some place and watchingthis action(surgery) by live relay - no - the very Laws of the Orderthat will determine the results of that action is Ishwara itself.You jump from a tree - the very law that forces you to hurtle downat 9.8m/sec is Ishwara.

Now Bhagwaan asks this surgeon to surrender "his action" to Me, theSupreme Self - mayi sarvani karmani sannyasya. How?? I can surrenderto you something i have with me. You can ask me to surrender mywatch, my money, my food and so on. The results of my action are notmine - what/how then to surrender? I do have one and only one thingI can surrender - my attachment to the result for myself. My selfright now is my ego-sense- the sense of insignificance andseparation from Ishwara. Hence the result becomes important to me -because in that result I falsely see myself becoming a little moresignificant a little more complete - by gaining more respect, money,pleasure, validation, honor, etc.

And these sow the seeds for me to get the results also for myselfalone - and these results can be the same, different or opposite ofwhat I expected for myself. So by attaching myself to the results ofthe action I am setting my"self" up for an unexpected occurence.This then sets up the lifelong struggle of ups and downs, which wecall samsara. A good result results in elation which is howevershortlived as the next thought is focussed now on eithersafeguarding it or repeating it. A bad result results in depressionand frustration. Either way it leads to mental agitation. This iswhat the Lord refers to as fever or agitation.(jvarah)

So instead for the good of my own self, the Lord advises me verykindly - "Look, you do not have an iota of control over the resultsof your actions. So why attach yourself to that. Surrender thatattachment to me."

Going back to the example of the surgeon - his attitude would/shouldbe "O Omniscient Lord. I am a mere instrument in your hands. Youbrought me to this world. By your Grace have some small skills beenimbibed my me whereby You have now given me this ability as well asopportunity to be of some service in a very limited way to one of mybrothers. My performance of this task is for You alone. Let myskills, which You alone have imparted, not fail me as I perform thistask."

Adhyatma chetasa refers to this attitude soaked in devotion to theSupreme Self whilst engaged in action.

Now if the surgery is successful or not, the surgeon is prepared.His mind is at ease, at peace. He can now focus his attention solelyon the job at hand. His entire inner equipments of his mind andintellect as well as his outer equipments of his hands and eyes arenow completely in sync. His whole being is now focussed wholly andsolely on the action itself - and this lends itself to dexterity inaction - and that the Bhagwan says is what is yoga. "Yoga karmasukausalam"

As Swami Chinmayananda-ji puts it so beautifully -"If hope is the child of the unborn future, ego is the lingeringmemory of a dead past. To revel in ego and hope is an attempt on ourpart to live, either with the dead moments of the past, or with theunborn moments of the future."

If the action is not "my" action, then the result is also not "my"result.I do not see myself as the "karta" and hence I do not see myslef asthe "bhokta"What happens happens in strict accordance Ishwara's perfect order,and I accept it gracefully as His prasad. Thus a surrenderingintellect gives rise to an accepting intellect.

This can be made applicable to each one of us - whatever activity wedo - we do it in this same spirit of surrender - we surrender theexpectations of the false self at the altar of the true self.

(As a byside - the word yudhyasva - gear up to fight.Shouldnt we believe in ahimsa? This is where in my humble opinionthe Hindu doctrine and understanding of ahimsa is quite differentfrom the Buddhist/Jain doctrines of Absolute ahimsa. In absoluteahimsa you never raise your hand no matter what - no exceptions. InHinduism, ahimsa is always with reference to the context. Allowinghimsa to take place to the righteous person without intervening isnot ahimsa - it is as bad as the person perpetrating that himsa.Hence it is that all our Gods (and even more so our Goddesses) arealways depicted with magnificent weaponry. There are hardly any God-images we can see which do not have at least one powerful weapon ofmassdestruction! This is quite different from depicitions of God innon-Hindu streams. Why is this so? I think this is because we do notattach an absolute and nonthinking value to ahimsa.Battle/war/killing/punishment, etc is very much accepted by usPROVIDED it is the last and only recourse AND himsa to dharma is atstake.)